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KT-PayPal Fraud

This is about how Duncan Oldham uses PayPal to defraud members of Koptalk. Its also about how to check if he has done it to you, behind your back. And if he has, how to get your money back.

Double-Dipping Dunkin
The best way of explaining how he carries out his scam it is to tell you a real life story.

___________________________________

April 15th, 2007

Photo: The Oldham family in your PayPal account

I’ve received an email today from a Koptalk member from Africa with copies of his PayPal account attached. I’ll call him Johnny. It shows how Duncan Oldham robbed him of ₤94 in cash over three years.

This is what it amounts to. He paid Oldham 1 x ₤14 membership fees in the Silver Club for 2004, and 2 x ₤26 in the Gold Club in 2005 and 2006 for a total of ₤66.

Oldham stole another 1 x ₤14 for 2004, and 2 x ₤26 for 2005, 2006 by double dipping into his account.

He did this by sending Johnny a demand for immediate payment of his membership fee one month before it was due – three years in a row.

When the automatic renewal mechanism that Oldham had caused to be put on Johnny’s PayPal account sprung into action one month later, Johnny’s account paid the fees again.

But in everyone of the three years Oldham never notified Johnny of the double payment, never refunded the money and pocketed the cash.

But that’s not all.

In addition, Oldham robbed Johnny of a further 2 x ₤14 memberships fees in the Silver Club (or Insider) in 2005 and 2006, even though Johnny had left the Silver to join the Gold Club two years ago.

And this false invoicing for the Silver Club has continued right up to today even though Oldham had abolished the Silver Club late last summer when he reorganized his site after the massive exodus of disgusted members.

So 1 x ₤14 and 2 x ₤26 + 2 x ₤14 = ₤94

Oldham has stolen ₤94 from this member alone.

And this is in addition to the ₤66 he received from him legitimately.

The good news is that as a result of reading the blog recently, Johnny has saved himself another ₤66. This includes the ₤26 he would have paid to renew in a couple of months, the ₤26 extra Oldham would have stolen through double-dipping and the ₤14 he would have stolen for the non-existing Silver Club membership.

Because when Johnny discovered the scam the other day, he cancelled his membership in Koptalk. As he did so, he received notice from Koptalk through PayPal that the renewal of both the Gold Club and the non-existing Silver Club fees was due in June.

You can hardly get more hard-faced than that, can you?

This is the case of one member of Koptalk. I believe Oldham and his partner-in-crime – his dependent step-brother and full time stooge, Steve MacNeish – have been robbing members like this on a large scale.

Johnny can hardly believe it. The scam worked just as the blog said it does. But like many who were deflected by Oldham’s lies, he was reluctant to believe us.

He never expected to be robbed by someone who claimed to be “a die-hard Red”.

But that’s how confidence tricks work – isn’t it? They gain your confidence so that you suspend your normal caution when paying out money. Its another example of how Duncan Oldham uses the massive goodwill attached the venerable name of LFC to pick pockets.

I’d like to thank Johnny (1) for swallowing his pride to tell the story (2) for the confidence he has shown in allowing me to condense it on the blog as warning to those still caught up in Koptalk. (He gave me permission to post his PayPal account on the blog. I have taken a screen shot of the relevant bits. If anyone wants the full Excel document for forensic purposes, please write to me. Note the references to Canadian $ arises from the fact that Johnny is now at a Canadian university).

You met Johnny before on the blog. He’s the person I referred to the other day who wrote to say he had just become convinced by posts on the blog that KT was garbage. Click Here

But at that stage he did not intent to cancel his KT membership until it expired in June.

I wrote to him and warned him to cancel his automatic renewal now because even if he quit KT in June, Oldham would continue to take money from his PayPal account.

But even with his new-found confidence in the blog, Johnny did not really believe that Oldham would do such a thing – he thought I was exaggerating and he did not check his account.

Then he noticed an exchange on KT that was also highlighted in the Comments section of the blog:

“Anyway, yesterday the Fraudster/Conman posted an insider exclusive using the name “Informer”. Not surprising a member replied to the thread claiming, ” there is no such a person as an “Informer” and this “Informer” is Dunk himself trying to con people. He also mentioned about the recurring automatic Koptalk subscription through PayPal. This got me thinking and I took the opportunity to check my account history from the day I signed up with PayPal till today”.

So well done the poster who called Oldham’s bluff about the Informer – one of Oldham’s many aliases.

But its not all sweetness and light. Johnny also said:

“I have to say that currently there are a lot of naive and ignorant kids (immature members) on Koptalk who I don’t think have had the decency to read your blog or let alone snoop around and read the truth/facts.”

I don’t think there are a lot of any kind of members on Koptalk these days, although a small few post frenetically and give the false impression of activity.

Don’t Let Koptalk Pick-Pocket PayPal.

When you enter into a contract with Double-Dipping Dunkin Oldham its like inviting a Trojan Horse to live in your PayPal account.

– If you have cancelled your membership in Koptalk check now that you are still not paying.

– If you intend to cancel your membership when your current year expires, cancel your automatic renewal now, because Oldham will activate it even after you think you have left.

I’ll go further.

– Even if you intend to renew your membership in Koptalk – cancel the automatic renewal on your PayPal account now. Oldham will send you a letter demanding renewal of membership fee one month before its due. That gives you plenty of time to decide whether you want to go ahead with the renewal. In the meantime you will have taken back control.

This is how you chase the Oldham Double-Dipping Trojan Horse from your PayPal account.

Go to your PayPal account and log in.

Go to My Account

Go to History

Go to Show Menu

Go to Subscriptions

Go to Transaction Details

Select Cancel

Following the cancellation you should receive a confirmation email from PayPal.

It will look something like this:

Dear *******

You have successfully cancelled your subscription to Gold Club Renewal – 1 year.

Contact Information
If you have any questions about this subscription, please contact KOPTALK.COM Business name: KOPTALK.COM
Contact email: support@koptalk.com
Contact Phone: +449050280723

Thank you for using PayPal

The PayPal team.

_________________________________________

CLICK BANK Payments

If you paid through ClickBank scroll down for instructions on how to gain a refund.

__________________________________________

BANK Payments

Anyone who paid by a direct deposit from their bank account, should check that they have not left a standing annual order.

___________________________________________________

CREDIT CARD Payments

Despite Oldham’s recent claim that George Gillett paid by credit card, it is unlikely that Oldham has a merchant’s account that would enable such a transaction. He probably would not pass the credit and banking checks to qualify for a merchant’s account. Also, he likes to avoid the independent records a merchant account would provide that would be invaluable to Inland Revenue, the police and the courts. However, we don’t know for certain if he does.

If you ever did pay Oldham for membership by credit card (as opposed to paying PayPal by credit card) it is possible that any original invoice from Koptalk would have sought your authorization for annual automatic renewal. So it is possible that you may still be paying him without realizing. Check your credit card records.

_____________________________________________________

Anyone who paid Oldham by PayPal in the past should check their PayPal account now for all the years they have paid Koptalk.

Check that you have not paid twice in any year, and that he has not charged you for for the Gold Club and the Silver Club (or Insider) simultaneously. It’s one or the other. He can’t have both.

If you discover he has extracted extra payments by means of the automatic renewal feature, please follow the step-by-step guide given below on how to get your money back.

In any court proceedings you will be suing Duncan Oldham, personally. He is the sole owner of Koptalk.com Koptalk is not a registered company. It is unknown at Companies House. It does not keep hard copy accounts of its sales or the money it raises for so-called charities. It does not file returns to Inland Revenue either for the purposes of business tax or the personal tax or national insurance of its owner and employees. It does not collect or remit VAT on the sale of its goods and services. It does not register its charities with the Charity Commissoners. It tries to hide behind PO Boxes rather than street addresses.

Think of Koptalk and associated sites as Duncan Oldham’s personal pocket. Only he knows what comes in and what goes out. One of the reasons he does not use regular banks is because that would involve traceable records.

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How to obtain a Refund directly from PayPal

That in itself make it very valuable. Oldham’s scams work best on overseas LFC supporters. They love the club but have to rely on the internet to find fellow fans. They find Koptalk through the traps he sets in search engines.

At first, they believe Oldham’s sales pitch because they don’t know his record as a con man in the UK. When they find out, they cannot easily use the small claims court in the UK. Oldham exploits this situation.

We’ve shown, for example, how Oldham overcharged Johnny from Africa ₤94 in three years. HERE

Terry’s letter is even more valuable because he demonstrates how he beat Oldham’s PayPal scam. And he sets out clearly how everyone else can use the same technique.

I’ll thank Terry for his excellent letter and allow it to speak for itself:

_____________________________________________________

Hi Rupert Insider,

I am a die-hard Reds fan for nearly 15 years.

I read with interest your blog on Koptalk and was flabbergasted at the rubbish I have been exposed to for 2 years (yes that’s how long I subscribed to Koptalk).

I paid using PayPal because I am from Singapore and of course was subjected to the auto-renewal of subscription. As I did not have a PayPal account when I first subscribed, my friend Vince paid for me so the subscription was under his name. For the first year, even though the money was deducted automatically, my access was blocked for a few weeks while my friend tried to convince them the subscription was paid.

For this current one, I was determined not to contribute any more of my hard-earned cash to this swindler. I found an easier way to get back money from the auto-renewal of subscription. All anyone who has his money deducted from their credit card has to do is to :

1) Log in to PayPal
2) Click on All account activity
3) Click on ‘Details’ in the entry ‘Payment to Koptalk.Com’
4) Near the end of the transaction page, there would be a link for users to ‘Report a Dispute’
5) Just fill in the form after clicking on it. I selected ‘Non-receipt’ as the reason for dispute.

That’s it. On the PayPal website, it will be written that the seller (Koptalk in this case) would be getting a chance to reply.

Unfortunately for dunk and fortunately for us, what PayPal does is to subtract the amount under dispute from his PayPal balance until after resolution. Therefore, all you have to do is submit the dispute request and the money disappears from his balance.

Now you wait, because PayPal is very protective towards buyers. They will not re-credit back the amount until they are satisfied that the buyer is happy.

If after 2 weeks, the seller does not reply, the money is automatically credited back.

If the seller does reply, the buyer has to fill in a form in PayPal which basically lets him declare he is happy with the seller, before the seller gets his money back.

If things are not settled in 2 weeks, the matter will be escalated to human intervention.

The easy part will be then to point the PayPal person to your blog. (ALL THIS WHILE YOUR MONEY IS NO LONGER IN THE SELLER’S ACCOUNT UNTIL YOU DECLARE YOU ARE SATISFIED)

I know all these details about PayPal because I used to run a small business selling to overseas clients and some of them expect their goods after 2 days of payment even though I am sending from Singapore (in Asia) to USA. They will do the PayPal dispute thing and my money will disappear even though I sent the goods. It is pretty difficult to get back the money after someone sends a dispute.

My friend got his credit card credited back with the money one day after I submitted my dispute (dunk watches his PayPal closely I suppose).

This is dunk’s reply to the dispute.

Vincent don’t be a clown. Go to the support site at www.koptalk.info as it clearly explains how PayPal bills you. It says this when you sign up on PayPal’s page. Try signing up now but don’t complete the sign up process and you will see the terms clearly displayed. It’s easy to cancel it and it’s just as easy for us to refund you. The website link you have included is people we have kicked off our site who are associated to a new Liverpool FC website. You’d have to be very, very naive or thick to believe what they say. Ask them why they haven’t reported such allegations to the police. Because it’s fairytale stuff. Issuing a refund is never a problem hence the reason I’m authorizing this now for you. Don’t let yourself be dragged in, surely you are more interlligent than that even if some of these people are your friends. KopTalk has been on the internet for 10 years and until last summer when we kicked these people out we’d never had any problems. No genuine Liverpool fan would entertain anyone so bitter who has targeted innocent people including children, a disbaled family member and even the innocent lives of 96 Reds who died at Hillsborough purely to score brownie points. Shame on you for allowing yourself to become a part of it.

Now that’s a load of rubbish which I don’t understand even though I tried to read it twice. But the thinly-veiled insults to somebody who has paid him 2 years of subscription is obvious and infuriating.

Anyway I hope with this email I could help a few of my fellow conned users. Great work on your blog anyway!

Regards,

Terence

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I wrote back to Terence and asked him how long after the initial transaction could someone make use of this technique. This is his reply:

“If you have a Paypal account, you could log into it and go to ‘Resolution Center’ under ‘My account’ where there would be a ‘Report a problem’ link. Clicking on it will bring you to a page with full information on the Dispute process. Unfortunately I can’t paste the link here because Paypal requires you to be logged in.

As for your question, here’s a snippet from the link I described above.

Most disputes are the result of simple misunderstandings. It’s best to initiate communication with the seller as soon as you recognize a potential problem.

You can open a dispute in the Resolution Center within 45 calendar days of payment. By opening a dispute, you are able to communicate directly with your seller to work out a problem transaction.

If you and your seller are unable to agree on a solution, you must escalate the dispute to a PayPal claim within 20 calendar days of the date the dispute was opened. By escalating to a claim, you would be asking PayPal to review the case and decide the outcome.

Full details are available from the PayPal website.

I guess you could post this up to help others.”

Terence

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Enclosed: Copy of the PayPal account transaction referred to in the letter. We have smudged the surname of the account and the account number to protect the identity of Vince. Click to enlarge

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POSTCRIPT: The first quick response to Terrence came in today. NOTICE that he got a refund immediately using Terence’s method . But for overcharges dating back to June 2006. So forget the 45 days limit. Go for it!

Rupert,

I have to thank you so much for your post about how to get money back if it has been taken off you paypal account. It was posted yesterday by a guy form Singapore who unlocked the Koptalk scam. I have attached a screen shot of my paypal account where Koptalk took 2 subscriptions off me within 3 days. I then used the steps as outlined in your post, and this morning I got a refund for being billed twice for my subscription.

I used the blog link to show how koptalk frauds people out of money. Paypal have an excellent resolution centre that sorts out everything out for you. I was checking my paypal account recently just to make sure that no auto renewals were being taken out on my account, and I decided that I should check my account to to when I signed up. I was totally amazed that koptalk had the nerve to bill me twice for the one subscripion within 3 days of each other. I never noticed it, and it was my fault for not noticing it at the time. I just nevert doubted that fellow liverpool fans would do that to another fan, but there it is he is not a liverpool fan.

Anyway I got my money back and its thanks toyou and the wonderful work on the Blog.

Simply fill in the fields asking for the different identifying information. From the drop-down menu on Subject of Request, select I would like to request a refund.

From the experience of a former KopTalker based in Croatia, we’re aware that you don’t need to provide much detail in the Question field. Just say that you would like a refund for your purchase of a KopTalk membership, because of its fraudulent nature, and include a link to the blog. Something like:

Check your entire PayPal account history and determine whether you have been charged twice in any year or charged for both the Gold Club and Silver and Insider at the same time.

If so, note the amounts involved and the dates when money was debited. Total the money owed to you. If you have any letters or e-mails from Koptalk or Oldham asking for payment related to any subscription, dig these out.________________________________________________________Step 2

Ask for a refund.

Past experience shows that Oldham will prefer to settle directly, rather than risk court proceedings. And he knows he is being monitored by a Trading Standards Officer in North Tyneside. So it may save you a lot of hassle if you simply demand your money back from him. You can do this by email to Oldham dunk2007@koptalk.com or by opening a support ticket, if you are a current member.

State what he owes you and ask for a full refund to your PayPal account within three days.

The weakness of this approach is that he can string you out to delay you and then fail to pay. And you may have no record of your request.

If you are successful with this approach, please let us know.____________________________________________________Step 3

If you use the courts it is important that you can demonstrate that you first requested a refund from Oldham and warned him that if he did not pay you will commence legal proceedings. Its normal to give 14 days notice.

So, if you have followed Step 3 and he has not paid you within three days, its best to make a new demand by letter.

I have prepared a model letter for you, below, Template 1. You can modify it to reflect your unique situation.

You should send one copy of your letter to Oldham and keep one for yourself. It is good to be able to prove to the court that the letter was delivered. You can do that by sending it recorded delivery. This should cost under £1 within the UK. It will prevent Oldham from delaying matters by pretending not to have received it. Retain your proof of postage, in case it is needed later

You might also cut and paste your letter into an email format and send that to Oldham. You should guard the “sent” copy and all headings.

Hopefully, he will offer to pay up immediately so that legal proceedings would not be necessary. But he may ask you to correspond by e-mail or MSN Messenger or, if you are a current member, by inviting you to open a support ticket.

This may be a delaying tactic and you do not have to respond to it. However, it is best that you are seen to have given him an opportunity to explain himself and to settle with you.

If you do correspond with him, keep copies of everything you send and receive including transcripts of any online communications.

If he agrees to pay insist that he refunds directly to your PayPal account, in full, and within 3 working days. Reiterate clearly that if he does not do so, you intend to commence legal proceedings immediately after the original period of 14 days notice expires.

Whether you are successful or unsuccessful with this approach, please let us know._________________________________________________________Step 4

Should Oldham fail to respond, or refuse to pay, or go back on a promise to do so, you should start legal proceedings. To do this you have to obtain the claim form.

Alternatively, you can call at your local county court and pick up a form there.

The online method is the quickest and simplest and the one I would recommend.

To access it you need a credit or debit card to pay the court fee. But I assume this isn’t a problem for you, since you probably used one to pay into PayPal for Koptalk in the first place.

Court fees typically vary from £30 to £120, but I expect them to be £30 in your case because the sums at stake are relatively small. (But note that you can claim for sums up to £5,000 in the small claims court).

The court refunds your fees in full when you win your case. The court may also order Oldham to pay certain other expenses you may have.

And don’t worry too much about being forced to pay Oldham’s legal costs if you lose.

First, your claim is about as open-and-shut a claim as you can imagine. You will win.

Second, it is very unusual in the small claims court that losing claimants are ordered to pay the defendant’s costs and then only where the claimant has not acted in good faith such as when he has sued the wrong person or lied about evidence. So going the small claims route is very low risk.____________________________________________________

Step 5

The law permits you to claim Oldham-Koptalk overcharges dating back 6 years in England and Wales and 5 years in Scotland.

So depending in which country you file your claim, your should adjust it to reflect these limits.

In the proceedings you are the “Claimant” and Oldham is the “Defendant”.Your claim should be against “Duncan Oldhamcarrying on business as Koptalk.com”

Below, I have prepared a template that you can use to enter the particulars of your claim. Template 2

On the form, it is important to be brief. At this stage you are not in a trial. You are not being asked to present hard evidence.

You can, however, attach to your initial claim printouts of statements from PayPal that show the double-dipping. It would be helpful for the court if you were to highlight the PayPal payments so that they stood out from the other items.

If your claim does eventually go to trial then you will be asked to present your evidence in court. But hopefully Oldham will pay before it ever comes to that.

_________________________________________________ Step 6

When you have completed the form follow the instructions on how to submit it.

It takes 5 days for the claim to be ‘serviced’. After this time, Oldham has 14 days to acknowledge it. If he doesn’t, you can request ‘judgment by default’.

If you submitted the claim online, you can log in and request judgment by default as soon as the 14 days deadline passes. That would automatically be a victory for you.

But Oldham may acknowledge the claim, giving himself another 14 days to enter a defence. But if he fails to enter a defence in that time, you can apply for another ‘judgment by default’ – that would be 28 days after Oldham was originally served with the claim.

Oldham also has the option of settling your claim in full. If he does you would be notified by the court. This is quicker and easier if you have filed the claim online. You can file your response to the court online.

Oldham also has the right to contest the claim and defend himself. This is very unlikely, as your evidence should be ample proof of his wrongdoing and he would know that he is certain to lose, risking another judgment on his record. But if he insists on a trial, the case would be heard in the small claims section of the country court.

You would need to prepare evidence, which would consist of full PayPal statements proving the double-dipping, including all dates and amounts, and copies of all correspondence between you and him, including any demands for payment you may have.

Check your PayPal account to see if it has an automated renewal order for Koptalk. Cancel it now.

Even if you intend to renew your membership in Koptalk you do not need the automated renewal mechanism on your account. You can pay when you receive notice from Koptalk or when you discover you membership has expired. If and when you buy another membership make sure that at that time Oldham has not caused yet placed yet another annual renewal notice on your account.

To check for the automated renewal order and cancel it now, use the blog’s step-by-step guide, HERE.
_________________________________________________________

Claimants Not Resident in the UK

Everything said above applies to you.

As a non-resident you can use the UK small claims court but you must inform the court of an address in the UK where it can serve you with papers. This could be the address of a solicitor, a company or friend.

(Those wishing to help overseas claimants can notify the blog – watch the Comments below).

When you send Oldham Letter 1 you will have to use a delivery service in your country which will provide you with proof of delivery. Alternatively, you can get your UK contact to send it for you by UK recorded delivery.

If your claim goes to trial you can bring a solicitor or friend to help you. But it may be that you, yourself will have to attend. I am seeking advice on that point. It may also be that if you win a judgment the court will order Oldham to pay your travel expenses to the court and the cost of your accommodations. This is another point on which I am seeking guidance.

Irish and other European claimants can use their own small claims system. But it may be that Oldham will not respond because he is not a resident of your country although he is obliged by European law. I suggest that you research that point in your own countries.

If you decide to use the UK courts it may be an idea to select a location which is most convenient for you e.g. Liverpool for Irish residents.______________________________________________Template 1

Subject: Formal Demand to Oldham with Notice of Legal Proceedings in 14 days if he does not. To be sent by recorded delivery and email._______________________________________________________[Insert your name and address and date ][State method of delivery such as “By RECORDED DELIVERY and Email”]Duncan Oldham,5 Swan Avenue, Off Bede Crescent,Wallsend,Tyne and Wear,NE28 7JH

Email: dunk2007@koptalk.comDear Mr. Oldham,

Demand for repayment of your overcharges for access to Koptalk.com

I refer you to payments you caused to be debited from my PayPal account when you submitted double invoices for the annual fee for membership or access to your website, Koptalk.com.

My user name on the Koptalk.com website is/was [Insert User Name or Names]My PayPal account name and number is:[Insert your PayPal account name and number]

As you know, my PayPal account had an automated payment mechanism that was designed to respond to your automated invoice for the annual membership fee when it became due.

But approximately one month before the membership fee was due you sent me an email invoice and a demand for payment. I responded with prompt payment from my PayPal account. I assumed in good faith that you would not submit a duplicate invoice to the automatic payment system one month later. But you did.

Without my being aware, the automated renewal mechanism on my PayPal account responded to your duplicate invoice by making the payment again. You did not inform me that you had demanded and received double payments nor did you repay them, nor did you change your practice of double invoicing after the first instance.

You overcharged on the following occasions: [Insert the dates and individual amounts]

I demand that you refund immediatley the total amount [insert the total claimed] to my above-referenced PayPal account.

I hereby give you notice that if I do not receive payment in fourteen calendar days from today’s date, I intend to commence legal proceedings through a country court to seek a judgment against you, personally, for the full amount, together with interest up to the date of judgment, court fees and any other expenses and costs the court will allow.

If you do not repay promptly and in full, I must conclude that your practice of overcharging in this way is systemic to your business and, as such, should be reported to Trading Standards in your region.

Govern yourself accordingly.

I am attaching a schedule of my claims. [Include a list of Paypal overcharges with dates and amounts. Be sure to include any charges made after you had quit Koptalk, or any charges for the Insider and Silver Club after you had transferred to the Gold Club. If you have copies of his email invoices, include them].

This is part of the claim form that you will download. It is intended to help you complete it correctly. It refers to the section of the form that asks for “Particulars of the Claim”

____________________________________________________________

Particulars of the Claim1. Between [insert date of first overcharge] and [insert date of last overcharge] , the Defendant caused double charges to be debited from the Claimant’s PayPal account in relation to the annual membership or access fee to the Koptalk.com website of which the Defendant is the sole owner.

2. The Defendant submitted to the Claimant an email invoice one month before the membership was due which the Claimant paid by PayPal. The Defendant sent a duplicate invoice designed to activate the automatic renewal mechanism on the Claimant’s PayPal account and by that means the Defendant obtained double payment from the Claimant.

3. The Defendant did not inform the Claimant that he had double-billed, or that he received double payment, and did not repay the overcharge but repeated the procedure.

4. Under the County Courts Act, the Claimant is entitled to interest of 8% per annum from the date he was deprived of the money. The interest on each of the overcharges is [insert amount of interest levied at 8% per annum on each overcharge] accruing at the daily rate of 0.21% until judgment or payment.

4. The Claimant asks the court to enter judgment in his favour for [insert total of overcharges] plus interest for a total of [insert total charges plus interest]__________________________________________________

If you have never brought a legal claim before it might be scary for you. But the ‘small claims track’ differs from normal court proceedings. It is designed to be simple, quick and easy.

You can check in on the blog and ask questions in the Comments section. However, this post has already been copied to the stickie on the tool bar KT-PayPal Fraud. So you can continue to use the Comments thereafter the post is no longer current.

If you are in the UK and want some free independent advice you might want to consult a Citizens’ Advice Bureau representative.

However, I would stress again that you should relax, follow the simple instructions I have given here and don’t get too complicated. ___________________________________________

Trading Standards

In the last year, Oldham has been investigated for illegal trading activities by a Trading Standard Officer who interviewed him formally. That officer continues to monitor the situation.

The blog will be making a presentation to him to alert him to Oldham’s practice of double-dipping in PayPal accounts. It will help if Oldhams’ victims report to the blog so that we can support the points we make.

The threat of a renewed investigation that might result in criminal charges might motivate Oldham to settle with claimants. Claimants, especially those not resident in the UK , are encouraged to warn Oldham that they will report directly to the appropriate officer if Oldham does not pay promptly. To be effective any such complaints to Trading Standards must provide the claimants proper name and address, wherever it is.

Many contributors to the blog have complained about Koptalk’s custom of ‘double dipping’. Those members who subscribed to Koptalk through PayPal were subject to an automated renewal mechanism on their account that paid their subscription fee annually.

However, in many cases, Koptalk also billed members a month before their next annual fee was due. If you received one of these demands and paid up as a result, it is very likely that you have also paid through the automated renewal order on your account – in effect paying twice for your membership. And this might be the case for however many years you were a member of Koptalk.

Oldham knows this, but has made no attempt to inform customers who were charged twice or to refund the monies he collected.

And others have reported that they were charged for membership in the Insider and Silver Club even after they had upgraded to the Gold Club. They were charged for both simultaneously and charged twice each time.

Other contributors to the blog have reported how they were charged by Koptalk even after they allowed their membership to lapse.

Assuming this has occurred for scores or even hundreds of members every year, then that is a large sum of money that does not belong to Oldham which he has pocketed.

If you are a current or former member of Koptalk we urge you to check your PayPal records as soon as possible to determine whether you have been overcharged.

By joining with others to collect from him you will be helping to hold him to account and weakening his financial ability to continue the practice against other LFC supporters.

Even if you don’t need the money yourself, there are many causes far more worthy than Oldham to whom you could donate it. Might I suggest the Hillsborough Justice Campaign (HJC) or perhaps even the Alder Hey Childrens Hospital? At least by donating directly to the hospital, rather than through Koptalk, you can be sure this time that it has reached them.
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However, that is probably only a viable option for UK residents. An important point to note there is that it’s crucial that you can demonstrate that you’ve firstly requested a refund from Oldham, informing him that you intend to take court action if he fails to act, before proceeding down the legal route. It does seem to be easy enough to do online, though.

Edit: This comment was written before “How to get your money back from Koptalk” was posted. As that post makes clear, non-residents of the UK may also use the UK small claims court if they can provide an address in the UK where court papers can be served, such as the address of a solicitor, company, or a friend who is willing to act as a post box.

I believe this site & it’s sole owner have been brought to your attention before, & that those who did so have been refunded. The below link relates to a double payment being taken from users – not the case with me, but I only recently became aware that money paid for fraudulent items can be reclaimed hence the delay in my contact.

I’m trying to locate the payment in my account history – I definitely paid via paypal & believe this was in July ’05. I’d like to know if it’s possible to claim a refund of this money; the services promised at the start were clearly not delivered.

I don’t hold out much hope because I’m sure I’ve left it too late, but at least this request may glean a definitive answer on whether they will refund you solely for koptalk’s services not being as stated, and the length of time you have to claim such a refund within.

Due to this it seems worth printing as it may assist someone else getting a refund, or at the very least spur people into action if they’re approaching a time period paypal quote as final after purchase for being able to
claim a refund.

When they reply I’ll post it up here. Please ignore if this has already been covered; I haven’t read all the posts on here and thought better risk it being posted twice than not at all.

Dunk claims it’s paypal who puts the recurring payments on the subscriptions. But if you read the “Subscriptions and recurring payment manual” on paypal, you will see that this is something koptalk chooses:

Recurring Basis
Select “Yes” if you would like your subscribers to be billed on a recurring basis. This
means that after the regular billing cycle that you previously entered is complete, your
customers’ subscriptions will be automatically renewed unless a customer manually
cancels his subscription. If you select “No,” your customers’ subscriptions and payments
will end after the first cycle is completed.

Yes, it is quite important that everyone aware of the tactic used to attempt to get your information.

In fact, there are many fraud cases happen and the latest one is sending you email to inform that your account has being limited access. I have wrote the review on this latest paypal fraud tactic and thoughts of sharing with you and your readers.

#442263 – February 06, 2009 18:43 How long will it take to refund my subscription to Koptalk
rborhara rborhara
KopTalk VIP

Registered: August 17, 2007
Posts: 507 Guys

Didnt want to really post on here – but 3 emails not one reply from Koptlak- and a low priority for call ticked request logged
I was going to renew my sub once i get back from hols -but im having to seriously consider that – i think im fairly resonable have mentioned that for 2 years you have taken money out of my account twice in succession year – not just once and i only have one user account – either im due a refund/s or a free sub this year. im resonable but would like replies to my open tickets a lot quicker that the money coming out of my paypal account.

I look forward to my reply
Great forum poor service recieved when needed